Are dealers "dealing" on 17's?

My niece got rear-ended in her 2015 Mazda 3 and the car was totaled. She compared the RAV 4, CR-V and CX-5 and decided on the Mazda.

My brother and I both drive 2016 CX-5's and all three of these vehicles were purchased at the same dealer and the same salesperson. My niece and brother went to purchase a new 17 from the same salesman yesterday. They wouldn't make a deal other than MSRP less current incentives. They walked. This is a complete departure from our prior experiences with this dealer.

Are the new CX-5's so popular the dealers won't deal?

No,not at all. They'll deal,and do as you stated,walk if they don't.

$4k min can be gotten off if you're game and want it...

Maybe the reason that they do not want to get the price down is because they already sold enough cars to get the incentive from Mazda and now they do not care.
Visit another dealer and be ready to walk away if the price is not right.

My closest two dealers are being pretty firm with the CX-5 as well. They are talking $1k off MSRP before incentives. Based on where they're at and previous experience with them, I'm guessing they'll go about $2k off MSRP plus incentives but not lower, which is pretty firm IMO. This is if I do not finance with them. In my area, the only incentives on the CX-5 are lease, financing, military, and $500 Mazda loyalty. Every other 2017 model in Mazda's lineup has a cash incentive on it except the CX-5. And it does seem to be selling well for them. They are much more willing to deal on the other models, especially 2017s.

Another thing I've noticed is that the best deals around here are usually in the spring time. Back in April, they were offering my wife over $5k off MSRP for either the CX-5 or CX-9.

I just bought one for invoice less incentives.

Not a single centavo discount here from the FWD up to the AWD diesel.

I am currently in the middle of a bidding war with 2 dealerships. Some of the pricing i have seen in the sticky thread at the top of the Lounge is confusing(start at the end of the thread for relevancy). Here is what I am after:

2017 CX5 AWD Touring with PEP, black or grey on black.

Dealer "A" offer: MSRP of $28935 and after incentives and an additional goodwill $100 came to a price of $26389. The guy was getting married last weekend and he turned the deal over to his manager. I shot back an email and quoted a price I had seen in the sticky thread from a buyer in the Bay area. He countered with an offer of $26160 or $27160 but absolutely $26660. Confused? So am I. The first salesman quoted me a price on a car with the wrong color of interior, his manager quoted me a price on a car with the wrong exterior color. When Manager got into his pricing, he was at at $26660 and said he would reduce the sale price by $500 and then quoted a price that is $500 higher @$27160, not $26160 which is what a $500 decrease should be. And do any of these prices even matter on them quoting prices on the wrong vehicle?

Dealer "B" has been very deliberate with his pricing, and easy to understand. Actually recorded and sent a short video of the car to me. His quote on the car I mention is $28935-rebates =$26,692 +tax title and fee, =$28596 OTD. He most likely will not move any further on price but I might be able to get a set of fogs thrown in for free or greatly reduced.

So either dealer here that I am quoting are within $500 or so of each other, and money is money. If I can nail down Dealer "A" to the correct car and price, I might bite.

Road Warrior2 said:

Dealer "A" offer: MSRP of $28935 and after incentives and an additional goodwill $100 came to a price of $26389.

Dealer "B" has been very deliberate with his pricing, and easy to understand. Actually recorded and sent a short video of the car to me. His quote on the car I mention is $28935-rebates =$26,692 +tax title and fee, =$28596 OTD. He most likely will not move any further on price but I might be able to get a set of fogs thrown in for free or greatly reduced.

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It amazes me how much more of a discount you get on a Mazda on the West coast as opposed to the East coast. Most quotes around here average about $27,500 with several dealers above $28,000 and one (a few hours away) being slightly under $27,000.

Road Warrior - under $27K for your specs is pretty solid in my experience in the Midwest. I had several 26,300-26,800 quotes for the same thing. The talk of $4K off extends to the GTs, from everything I've seen.

Road Warrior2 said:

I am currently in the middle of a bidding war with 2 dealerships. Some of the pricing i have seen in the sticky thread at the top of the Lounge is confusing(start at the end of the thread for relevancy). Here is what I am after:

2017 CX5 AWD Touring with PEP, black or grey on black.

Dealer "A" offer: MSRP of $28935 and after incentives and an additional goodwill $100 came to a price of $26389. The guy was getting married last weekend and he turned the deal over to his manager. I shot back an email and quoted a price I had seen in the sticky thread from a buyer in the Bay area. He countered with an offer of $26160 or $27160 but absolutely $26660. Confused? So am I. The first salesman quoted me a price on a car with the wrong color of interior, his manager quoted me a price on a car with the wrong exterior color. When Manager got into his pricing, he was at at $26660 and said he would reduce the sale price by $500 and then quoted a price that is $500 higher @$27160, not $26160 which is what a $500 decrease should be. And do any of these prices even matter on them quoting prices on the wrong vehicle?

Dealer "B" has been very deliberate with his pricing, and easy to understand. Actually recorded and sent a short video of the car to me. His quote on the car I mention is $28935-rebates =$26,692 +tax title and fee, =$28596 OTD. He most likely will not move any further on price but I might be able to get a set of fogs thrown in for free or greatly reduced.

So either dealer here that I am quoting are within $500 or so of each other, and money is money. If I can nail down Dealer "A" to the correct car and price, I might bite.

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Thanks everyone. This is the Portland (Oregon) area. They have inquiries out to the other area dealers. I'll see if she will share which version is purchased and at what price, once it happens.

You might want to try this:

= Look through the "Current Selling Price for a CX-5" thread here and know what you consider to be a reasonable price for your exact Model/Trim/Color before you begin.

= Best time to do this is during the last week of the month, but timed so your purchase will occur before the end of the month so they can tally it against their monthly quota.

= Check the internet inventory listings for the dealers that have the car (Model/Trim/Color) you want. Get the phone numbers of their Internet Sales Rep. (ideally for 3 - 5 Mazda dealers in your area) (doesn't really matter how far they are away). If they're distant ask if they can deliver the car if you buy it (this is getting more and more common as the distant dealer considers you a customer they otherwise would never have had).

= Call them up and tell them you want their best offer on the Model/Trim/Color CX-5 of your choice, give them one or two days to reply. Tell them you won't be pursuing the purchase with any dealership that won't give you an actual first bid *in writing via email* (they'll all want to wait until you get your bids in then counter it, no dice on that. No bid, no deal). Make sure the bids include the "Out the Door" price including Tax, Title, License, "Doc fees", and any other processing fees all itemized. At that point you can either accept the lowest bid, or call each one back and offer them a chance to better the lowest. If you're in a rural area it's best if you can include at least one or two dealers from a nearby urban area. They'll have more pricing latitude due to higher volume and are used to competing on price. Rural dealers can be more rigid on pricing since they are used relying on the fact that they're the only game in town.

The point is that the only real leverage you have is to get dealers to compete among themselves. Don't go into a dealership for any reason, use the phone. During the test drive phase tell them ahead of time you're also considering a CUV of another Make (e.g. Honda CRV) and you haven't test driven it yet and won't be making your choice until you do, so you can extricate yourself from the dealer without a big sales harangue. Once you're on their turf they'll use every trick to keep you from leaving without a purchase. Their goal will be to make sure you don't have more than one dealer's pricing... theirs..

On the phone the playing field is leveled. At the dealership you're at a disadvantage.

Edit: Make sure they also include the VIN (and model, trim and color) of the particular car they're offering n the written quote, along with the above mentioned Price/Out the door pricing.

sonoran said:

You might want to try this:

= Look through the "Current Selling Price for a CX-5" thread here and know what you consider to be a reasonable price for your exact Model/Trim/Color before you begin.

= Best time to do this is during the last week of the month, but timed so your purchase will occur before the end of the month so they can tally it against their monthly quota.

= Check the internet inventory listings for the dealers that have the car (Model/Trim/Color) you want. Get the phone numbers of their Internet Sales Rep. (ideally for 3 - 5 Mazda dealers in your area) (doesn't really matter how far they are away). If they're distant ask if they can deliver the car if you buy it (this is getting more and more common as the distant dealer considers you a customer they otherwise would never have had).

= Call them up and tell them you want their best offer on the Model/Trim/Color CX-5 of your choice, give them one or two days to reply. Tell them you won't be pursuing the purchase with any dealership that won't give you an actual first bid *in writing via email* (they'll all want to wait until you get your bids in then counter it, no dice on that. No bid, no deal). Make sure the bids include the "Out the Door" price including Tax, Title, License, "Doc fees", and any other processing fees all itemized. At that point you can either accept the lowest bid, or call each one back and offer them a chance to better the lowest. If you're in a rural area it's best if you can include at least one or two dealers from a nearby urban area. They'll have more pricing latitude due to higher volume and be used to competing on price. Rural dealers can be more rigid on pricing since they are used relying on the fact that they're the only game in town.

The point is that the only real leverage you have is to get dealers to compete among themselves. Don't go into a dealership for any reason, use the phone. During the test drive phase tell them ahead of time you're also considering a CUV of another Make (e.g. Honda CRV) and you haven't test driven it yet and won't be making your choice until you do, so you can extricate yourself from the dealer without a big sales harangue. Once you're on their turf they'll use every trick to keep you from leaving without a purchase. On the phone the playing field is leveled. At the dealership you're at a disadvantage.

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I'll give the counter point.

The internet sales people that I have dealt with so far have been completely untrustworthy. One guy, an Autonation dealership, told me in a texting message that a car that they had listed on the net was being sold as we spoke. Problem with that was I was staring at the dealers website and it was a Sunday morning at 10am and they were closed. Another on a $28,500 vehicle, I inquired about a lease for the vehicle, 36mo, 10K miles....came back with a lease price of $1K down, $598 a month, $2K down $569 a month, $3K down $539 a month. This was a Ford Fusion Sport.

Completely agree about buying near the end of the month when they are up against numbers to make to get bonus, you can probably squeeze a few bills out of them. Another dealer I did my test drive at has not called me back or emailed. I stopped late on a Saturday afternoon and they were closing at 4pm. We did the test drive and they damn near chased me out the door.

The final 2 I'm dealing with, one I think is trying to run a shell game and throwing a lot of numbers against the wall to see what sticks. And granted I have all the emails as record of what was offered so all I have to do is say yea or nay. Absolute advantage from my standpoint that I can sit at home with the numbers and mull them over, no pressure.

Well if the Internet Sales Rep isn't trustworthy call the dealer back and talk to the Sales manager and tell them you want to deal with another rep. If the dealership as a whole is untrustworthy... well, what can you do except cross them off the list? Better you found out over the phone than get sucked into wasting much more of your time if you actually went there.

I think it's hard to generalize. Every dealership seems to behave a little differently during price negotiations. One of the gotchas I've experienced with making deals over the internet or phone is showing up to do the paperwork and the bill of sale isn't what I agreed to, putting you right into the old high pressure sales environment again. After this happened to me and my wife a couple of times, I tried insisting on having the dealer email me a scan of the actual purchase/sales agreement waiting for signature before I would come in to close the deal. I haven't found one willing to do that.

sonoran said:

Well if the Internet Sales Rep isn't trustworthy call the dealer back and talk to the Sales manager and tell them you want to deal with another rep. If the dealership as a whole is untrustworthy... well, what can you do except cross them off the list? Better you found out over the phone than get sucked into wasting much more of your time if you actually went there.

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One of the things that had me concerned before(while trying to buy a Fusion Sport) was this shell game they play with the car listing and the internet. The goal is to get you on the lot and then tell you they "sold that car but we have another very similar." Bait and switch. They post up very attractive prices on vehicles and once you get there....poof, gone. My always first question when dealing with the too good to be true prices on vehicles is Do you have the vehicle on the lot?

Sure there are things that can be done to manipulate anything. But think about how much better your situation is when you have another bid in your pocket, and/or a set of dealers you've already contacted that you can go back to and say Dealer "X" didn't work out, can you meet their price? When in you're in that situation and they switch the bait, you tell them: "I've got another bid that's only nominally more expensive and I'd rather pay the extra few dollars and deal with someone who'll honor their agreements... will you honor your *written* agreement or not?" And you can walk out if they don't because in all likelihood you do have another bid that's a decent/good price.

And you should know enough about actual pricing from your research to know if a deal is "too good to be true". If you go after an obvious low ball, you're just asking to baited.

The dealers that do this to you over the phone will do the same in person, you just won't have the backup and resources of other bids to use to bolster your case.

There's no magic solution, but doing what most people do: Walk into one dealership and making a deal in person when you have no other dealer's pricing, puts you in a much worse position IMO than this method.

sonoran said:

And you should know enough about actual pricing from your research to know if a deal is "too good to be true". If you go after an obvious low ball, you're just asking to baited.

The dealers that do this to you over the phone will do the same in person, you just won't have the backup and resources of other bids to use to bolster your case.

There's no magic solution, but doing what most people do: Walk into one dealership and making a deal in person when you have no other dealer's pricing, puts you in a much worse position IMO than this method.

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Several years back a friend got an amazing price on a new Mazda about 2 hours away from us. He got price verification in email and asked them on the phone several times if the price was going to be honored. Of course they said yes. When he got down there they wouldn't sell him the car at that price.

Meanwhile he could have saved himself a lot of time and grief just taking the offer from the local dealership. It was almost the same price as he ended up paying the crooks 2 hours away.

I'm not saying all the dealerships are like this but they do exist. Keep your wits about you.

Sure, in terms of ease and convenience it's easier to just do a deal with your local dealership. And there's nothing wrong with that per se. Maybe you value your time more than anything, maybe you don't want to hassle dealing with multiple dealers, maybe you have enough money that this isn't really a major purchase for you... who knows.

But there's a reason why businesses make major purchases by getting multiple bids, you get better pricing when vendors have to compete and you have a backup if one deal goes sour.

I've used this method to buy three different cars from three different dealers between me, my daughter and my wife, and I've never had any dealer renege on a written quote. I've had a dealer deliver a car to my house from 150 miles away and we signed the paperwork in my kitchen (he brought his wife down with him and they went to dinner afterwards). My experience is that when you're asking for these specifics in the quote, making sure you're getting it in writing, and indicate that your getting bids from other dealers, the unscrupulous dealers just won't bid at all. If they do you can also usually tell by the way they behave during the bidding process that they're problematic: changing prices, leaving out the VIN or car description, saying a car they have on the lot is gone, etc. I just drop them if the do that.

I spent 15 years buying expensive IT systems for a large company (among other things), you can usually tell pretty quickly when a vendor is a turd. My experience is it's not worth pursuing deals with these kinds of businesses, it'll cost you more time and money over the long run then you'll ever save on the purchase price. There are reputable businesses (dealers) out there, and they're the only ones worth using.

Right now I look at these dealers as Walmarts, the product is the same store to store and the price may vary by a few bucks and it is a matter of knowing your prices and asking for the lowest. You never will get it if you don't ask.

I just had another one send me an email and they want to drop the price another $200!

sonoran said:

Sure, in terms of ease and convenience it's easier to just do a deal with your local dealership. And there's nothing wrong with that per se. Maybe you value your time more than anything, maybe you don't want to hassle dealing with multiple dealers, maybe you have enough money that this isn't really a major purchase for you... who knows.

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I do a mix of the methods. Quotes from various dealers, some large dealerships and some smaller ones, and then I sit down with the local dealership to see if we can work out something reasonable. They know I have quote and have a good idea of what the car is worth so it tends to be reasonably civil and after a short time period of time it becomes obvious if they can get their numbers in the ballpark.

At least that's the way it used to work. It's been a while since I've bought a new car.